Recruitment problems in psychosocial oncology research

Key Points• Patient-reported distress does not necessarily reflect the patient's actual desire for help.• Distress may be either adaptive and helpful, or maladaptive.• Feasibility studies should assess interest and willingness of patients to receive professional psychosocial care.• Research on optimal recruitment strategies will improve enrollment in patient-based research in psychosocial oncology.• Greater reporting of problems with patient recruitment in clinical outcome studies in the field of psychosocial cancer treatment will help minimizing publication bias.